Tummy Troubles

Sorry for the delay in posting. It has been a VERY long week (even though it technically is monday already). Perron has been having some tummy issues for the past two weeks and we have spent the majority of that time trying to figure out what it is. We finally have it down to two different issues. Unfortunately it took a trip to the pediatrician, two trips to the pediatric gastroenterologist, a upper gi series, a new perscription formual, and a middle of the night trip to the ER. Based on the upper GI series Perron has pretty severe acid reflux...even though he doesn't spit up that bad and he certainly doesn't refuse feeds...we also think he might have a milk sensitivity. I don't think he has a true milk allergy, but it does definitely hurt his belly. He is on the highest dose of Zantax that he can be on for his age and he is on a specialty formula called Ele-Care. The formula cost $33 for a small can and you can't buy it at retail and it stinks like hell, so let's hope he doesn't have to stay on it. The bad news is that if he does have a milk sensitivity then he will not tolerate my breast milk well. After our trip to the ER...which was a nightmare that I don't even want to discuss (he is fine though) I put him on all breastmilk which he tolerated well until last night. It just makes his little belly hurt and get really gassy. I think that we will be able to rotate him between his formula and breast milk and keep him under control.

When he had the barium swallow for the upper GI series no one mentioned that it might be difficult for him to pass the barium. I would have appreciated a heads up. The barium basically turned in to hard pieces of "chalk" in his intestines that were anywhere from half and inch to an inch long and about a third of an inch wide. As you can imagine getting rid of those was no fun for him. After two calls to the pediatrican the nurse on call sent us to the ER at 3:30 in the morning on Saturday saying he needed an enema. So we pack up our 7 week old premature infant and take him to ground zero for disease in the city of Birmingham..the Children's Hospital emergency room. Once there they informed us that they don't do enema's on babies as small as he is and we were told to "give him apple juice". Are you FREAKING KIDDING ME! Could the nurse not have mentioned that in one of my frantic phone calls. The bitch ass (excuse my language but that is what she was) attending pediatrician then basically implied we were bad parents for bring our son down there and exposing him to all of those germs. She implied that he would be getting meningitis or some kind of infection that would cause him get septic because he was there. Like we just decided that there was nothing better to do at 3am on a Saturday morning so we would load ourselves up and head to the ER to see what was happening. I then of course was a nervous wreck all weekend thinking he was going to get sick. Stephen had to force me not to take his temperature ever three minutes all weekend long. Needless to say, the pediatrician's office will be hearing from me this morning. Why couldn't the nurse have said...by the way try some apple juice...that may work.

Any how, he is all better now. We are watching him really closely to make sure he doesn't exhibit any signs of illness. It is just really scary because a baby less than 3 months old can not localize infection and even a simple cold could very quickly turn into something deadly. Add his prematurity into the mix and it is extra scary and stressful. The GI series did show that he has what they call a standing column when he has reflux. Basically the food exits the stomach in and moves up the esophagus and stays there. It almost looked like a little food tornado. He is a trooper though and we are hoping we have the situation under control now and he will feel and sleep better! For his sake and mommy and daddy's! If it is not one thing it is another!